


ARCH/NEMESIS

by tongyi



Category: iKON (Kpop), 방탄소년단 | Bangtan Boys | BTS
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, M/M, show me the money 3
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-18
Updated: 2016-02-18
Packaged: 2018-05-20 09:44:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,594
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6001402
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tongyi/pseuds/tongyi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Namjoon isn’t lying when he says he really doesn’t care about Bobby. It’s not Bobby, it’s Namjoon - except, of course, that it just so happens to also be Bobby.</p>
            </blockquote>





	ARCH/NEMESIS

**Author's Note:**

  * For [cumrich](https://archiveofourown.org/users/cumrich/gifts).



> kimhanbin, I hope you enjoy this! I had a lot of fun with your prompts. I know this is a little top-heavy, but I hope this is close to what you were looking for. Happy Valentine's Day!

“You heard?” Ikje asks, leaning against the doorframe.

Namjoon doesn’t even bother looking up, just adjusts the sound balance on his mix. Ikje’s a gossip who loves the sound of his own voice, so of course he has a flair for the dramatic. Last week’s ‘You heard?’ had been about the seasonal vending machine change-up. Namjoon’s not worried. “You gonna tell me?”

“You see the schedule yet?” Ikje pauses for effect, because he and Namjoon both know the answer to that. Namjoon doesn’t look at the schedule anymore. He’s got it memorized to a T. “We got a newbie down in C on Tuesday nights and weekends.”

Which, okay, is actually kind of interesting. Namjoon looks up. Ikje looks smug when he meets his eyes, like Namjoon’s acknowledgment is a sign of victory. “Yeah?” Namjoon asks. “That’s cool. Who is it? Anyone we know?”

At that, the expression on Ikje’s face turns downright gleeful. “Bobby,” he says, almost a sing-song. “Sound familiar?” He doesn’t wait for Namjoon to answer before crowing, “Man, we got motherfuckin’ _YG_ in the house!”

 

They do, indeed, have motherfuckin’ YG in the house - or something like it, anyway. Rumor had YG, furious by the early bow-outs, making good on his promise of what would happen if Bobby and B.I didn’t win. B.I had been called the next G-Dragon enough times that he could weather the second disappointment, but there hasn’t been a peep of Bobby since the Show Me The Money tour ended. Not that Namjoon was checking. Rappers liked gossiping just as much as anyone, though, and Namjoon heard from Hyosang who heard from Stardom upper management who were apparently drinking buddies with some of the sound engineers at YG that Bobby’s contract was stuck in renegotiation limbo, that he’d been moved to the backburner in the meantime. Not, again, like Namjoon cared, but Hyosang got chatty when he was drunk, and Ikje is nothing if not encouraging.

Case in point: Ikje hustles Namjoon down the hallway to show him, not that Namjoon ever doubted him in the first place. He shoves him the last meter to check out Bobby’s name penciled into their schedule. It’s there: ‘BOBBY’ in all caps, in English, dark like he had pressed down extra-hard when writing his name, trying to leave an indelible impression. The sloppy letters crowd up against Namjoon’s name in the space for room D on weekends, because Bobby’s always been the kind of person who takes up more space than he's due.

Ikje’s eyeing Namjoon, waiting for a reaction.

“Great,” Namjoon says. “Bobby. Awesome.”

\--

It’s last year, it’s summer. Namjoon’s been waiting in line for what feels like hours and is probably much longer than that. There are twin stripes of sweat on his shoulders in the shape of his backpack straps, and his hair, which he spent more time than he’d like to admit shaping this morning, has wilted. Still, when the camera crew comes around for some more milliseconds of footage to maybe splice into the final episode cut, he musters up a holler, cupping his hand around his mouth. The line inches forward, and the cameraman moves on, looking for something he’ll deign actually worth filming.

They’re still in earshot, so Namjoon considers couching his words, before deciding, fuck it. They sure as hell weren’t couching their disinterest. “This fucking blows,” he says.

“Your mom blows,” Ikje responds absentmindedly, then seems to think about what he says. Next to him, Hyosang is giggling, a hysterical note entering his voice. “Wait, sorry. Yeah, you’re right. This blows.”

Namjoon’s saved from deciding if he needs to defend his mom’s honor when a commotion way down the block makes the camera crew a few meters beyond them perk up, before taking off in the direction of the action.

“What the fuck,” Ikje says blankly, pivoting on his heel. “What the fuck?” he repeats to the pimply high schooler behind them, who starts and fumbles his phone.

“Uh, I don’t know,” the kid says, hand pressing his phone to his chest. At Ikje’s unimpressed look, he ventures, “I heard some idols were gonna show up - maybe that’s them?”

“Oh, fuck,” Hyosang interjects, nodding, even though, hello, Topp Dogg. But he knew and everyone knew that wasn’t nearly the same as - “YG, right?”

Right. There’s a break in the crowd, and Namjoon catches sight of at least three different camera crews, all clustered around one focal point. Namjoon can almost see them salivating from where he stands. Namjoon didn’t bother watching the YG survival show, but it was impossible to miss the news afterwards, all the online fervor surrounding both the team that won and the team that didn’t, and especially the two boy wonder rappers anchoring the latter: Bobby and B.I. Namjoon held out for enough weeks on actually watching clips of the two of them that the view count on the videos when he finally did made him jealous in an awed, abstract way.

And then he’d watched them and been disappointed. He’d thought, both privately to himself and in group message to his crew, that they were okay, sure, but not _that_ good. They weren’t even good-looking, not even by YG’s standards.

Now, from where he’s standing, slightly leaning back for a better glimpse of the two of them just like everyone else in line, and pretending not to, also just like everyone else in line, he’s thinking they look skinnier than they did on TV; he’s thinking he could take them, easy; he’s thinking they're just kids, younger even than Namjoon; he’s thinking they don’t look like anything, or much.

\--

“Well. ( _pause_ ) Yeah, losing sucks. Of course I’m disappointed, but that’s life, right? No, obviously I wanted to win - yes, I thought I had a chance. I mean, but I got an all-pass in the second round and I worked really hard on writing my lyrics, so I thought…

Anyway. Was I _worried_ going in? Of course. It’s a competition, after all.

Was he _better_ than I thought? Well, idol or not idol, good rapping is good rapping.

Yes, that’s right, I was part of Big Hit for a while. No, I didn’t debut.

Actually, ( _laugh_ ) I’m in college now.

Yes.

Yes.

Ah… Well, he beat me, so. Sure. I hope he wins. ( _laugh_ )”

\--

“Wow,” Ikje says after, bumping his shoulder with his. It’s chilly out now that the sun’s down, and Namjoon burrows deeper into his hoodie. “Good answer. They’re gonna air that shit for sure. Got some of that Big Hit media training after all, huh.”

It's a joke. Big Hit didn’t have media training when Namjoon was there. They probably still don’t.

Namjoon forces a laugh. It’s true, at least he’ll get aired. Of the members of their crew who turned out to audition, that’s a respectable enough showing. Hunchul’s pretty face (and, okay, sick flow) got him an easy match-up in the one-on-ones. Hyosang was buzzed out in the individual assessment last week. Ikje went up today against and subsequently went down against some chick with a raspy, passable flow and a tiny waist. From what Namjoon could see from the screening room, Swings’ eyes didn’t even budge from her navel. Ikje didn’t stand a chance.

They pass a 7-11, which is when Namjoon remembers they haven’t eaten all day. He veers in the direction of it, grinning a little when he steps on Ikje’s heel and Ikje curses. They might as well load up on snacks before they head back to - where else? - the practice room. He’s got it booked for the rest of the night, so he might as well take advantage. There are a few tracks he’s working on, and an economics problem set he has to finish for class tomorrow.

“Man,” Ikje says, as if he's just thought of it, with a vehemence in his voice that’s almost lost in the soft swoosh of the automatic door. “This fucking sucks.”

\--

Bobby loses, bows out in the semifinals to Vasco, whose music Namjoon has been listening to since he was fourteen.

 _Good_ , Namjoon thinks when he hears the news, even if Vasco won off the disputable strength of a song with a trap beat and a rock ‘n’ roll melody.

They watch the final - Vasco versus Iron - together, Namjoon and his crew, still a little in disbelief that it’s Jung fucking Hunchul - _their_ Jung fucking Hunchul - up against _Vasco_ in the finals. They’re in Minwoo’s apartment, watching on his huge flat screen TV that wobbles every time someone inches past it to grab more beer.

During the lead up to the finale, the cameras cut for a moment to Bobby, who’s watching from the crowd. He’s nodding, clapping his hands. When he notices the camera, he smiles in its direction, eyes disappearing. There are no less than twenty people behind and surrounding him, tugging at his sleeve to look their way.

Namjoon is sitting on a comfortable couch with his crew and the rest of his friends around him, some of them brilliant, some of them just good enough, some of them doing it because what the hell, they love this shit, why not. So, no, he’s not jealous of Bobby, even if he can’t log onto a single one of his social media accounts without seeing someone link to one of his songs.

Anyway. Hunchul wins. It’s the right call, and they fucking lose it.

\--

It’s almost midnight on a Saturday, and all of Namjoon’s friends have left the building, literally. Half of them are with their girlfriends, so newly made and thus so pathetically enamored that even Ikje can’t bring himself to make Yoko Ono jokes.

“Fuck all y’all,” Ikje says, after his attempt to get a group together for drinking falls flat. “I’m gonna hit up my other friends.”

“What other friends?” Hyosang snorts. “You’re just going to go jerk off,” he adds, making the accompanying hand-to-crotch motion. Donghyuk’s girlfriend throws him a horrified look he doesn’t even notice, which is pretty indicative of why Hyosang does not have a girlfriend.

“Nothing wrong with that,” Ikje says, with supreme satisfaction. “At least I can get it up.”

Ikje, in case it wasn’t clear, also does not have a girlfriend.

“Okay,” Namjoon says, and waves them all out of his studio, laughing. “You all go do that. I’m gonna keep working.” He shuts the door on Ikje shouting _all work and no play makes Namjoon a dull -_

That was two hours ago. Namjoon’s been bent over his desk the entire time ever since, wrist sore from holding his pen, then holding his mouse, then holding his pen again. He stands up to stretch, spine crunching.

It’s always a little creepy late at night when no one else is around, but Namjoon is used to it. He likes the recording studios best this way. There’s something about the still, quiet air of an empty building that centers him, giving him the impression of a vacuum where his potential is limitless and his determination will make up for the rest, and nothing so banal as parental expectations or academic responsibilities can get in the way. But when he steps out into the hallway, it’s not the quiet he expects, but the snap of snare from next door.

Namjoon doesn’t need to check the calendar to know who’s in room C anymore. He just snorts quietly, heading to the bathroom.

The air is slightly chillier there, probably from some window cracked open somewhere to get rid of the rank smell of a bunch of hygienically-negligent kids and the equipment they all spit on. Namjoon forgot his hoodie in his chair, so he just quickly rinses his hands, skipping the soap. There aren’t any paper towels anymore, so he surreptitiously wipes his hands on his butt, idly wondering if having to sit in the same chair Ikje definitely farted in would negate the effects of his handwashing.

In the hallway, he runs into Bobby, almost literally, colliding as they both round a corner like they’re in a sitcom.

“Whoa,” Bobby says, reaching out a hand to touch Namjoon’s arm right above the elbow, an attempt to right him that would have been ineffectual anyway. “Watch it.”

Namjoon is maybe more tired than he thought he was, because he shrugs off the touch. “Why don’t _you_ watch it?”

Bobby raises his hands, grinning. “Didn’t mean anything by it,” he says, still amicable. “Namjoon, right? Don’t think I had a chance to say after, you know, everything” - this he punctuates with a handwave, as if to indicate _after, you know, I beat you in a televised competition where everything except the most negligible amount of skill mattered and I damn well took advantage of that_ \- “but I thought you were great.”

Is this guy for fucking real? “Yeah,” Namjoon says, a hint of nastiness edging out. “Just not as good as YG, right?”

And, somehow, Bobby’s smile just grows. “I guess,” he says, shrugging. “I wouldn’t know. Barely YG anymore.”

 

It's an awkward kiss, no way around it, and Namjoon was thirteen once. Bobby’s hands are rough and clammy when they tug at Namjoon’s shirt, pulling the hem out of his waistband so Bobby can slip his hands underneath, rubbing his knuckles with a flattering insistency at the trail of hair underneath Namjoon’s navel. Namjoon gets a hand under Bobby’s shirt to reciprocate, before quickly retreating. No point in feeling shittier about this situation than he already does.

The kiss is firm and fast, Bobby pursing his lips and pushing for one brief moment before pulling away. It feels like a handshake. Immediately after, he drops his mouth to Namjoon’s neck to bite with enthusiasm, as if kissing was the hard part, and he’s glad to have gotten the difficult shit out of the way. This was probably a YG thing. Or, like, an American thing.

Namjoon feels hot all over, his skin ill-fitting and itchy. There’s something about this entire situation that still feels unreal, even though he’s the one who’s here, Bobby’s body stretched out beneath him, Bobby’s hands all over Namjoon. It’s the same way he’s felt ever since he fell silent after Bobby’s YG comment, his mouth stretched in a lazy, placid smile as he let Namjoon ride his discomfort out. After a few tense seconds, he’d reached a hand up to circle tightly around Namjoon’s wrist.

“Hey,” he said, more casual than any proposition had the right to be. “You wanna?” He ran the pads of two fingers up the underside of Namjoon’s wrist with an intent that Namjoon would have to be an idiot to mistake.

To be honest, Namjoon wasn’t entirely sure he did. But he also wasn’t sure his pride would let him answer otherwise. “Screw you,” he said instead, matching Bobby’s tone.

His room was closer, so Namjoon took the lead, slamming the door shut behind him, not caring if Bobby had gotten his body all the way into the room yet.

“Watch it,” Bobby mocked, but he still let Namjoon muscle him up against the wall where he wanted him.

So Bobby sucks, but that’s nothing new.

Now, Namjoon is standing between Bobby’s spread legs, his shoulders squared against Bobby’s and his hands pinning Bobby’s hips down as they try to buck up against his.

“Fuck,” Bobby says in an open-mouthed groan against Namjoon’s collarbone. “Fucking - can you just - can you touch me already?”

He sounds eager. He sounds, if Namjoon isn’t reading this wrong, like he’s this close to _begging_ , as if this, all of this - being pinned against a hard surface by Namjoon, a guy who doesn’t think much of him and who has always made his dislike clear - is really doing it for him.

Namjoon doesn’t know what to make of that.

The thing is, Bobby’s probably not a bad guy. And if all the spots Mnet ran about Bobby’s tragic life story prior to getting to YG are true, he’s also probably not totally undeserving of whatever success he’s had so far. But Namjoon can’t help the irritation that flares up whenever he thinks about Bobby, even though he’d thought he put his professional envy to rest long ago. But there’s knowing something and _knowing_ something, and Namjoon knows his parents were right to make him go to college instead of Big Hit, and knows how difficult it is to make it in music, no matter talent or hard work or passion, and knows that Bobby is closer to him than he is to G-Dragon at this point, and knows that Bobby rents out a studio room three nights a week, too, just like him, but what Namjoon _knows_ is the feeling of satisfaction that follows sixteen close-to-perfect bars, only to look up and realize the cameras and the judges’ attention are trained on Bobby, just as they have been all along.

Namjoon isn’t lying when he says he really doesn’t care about Bobby. It’s not Bobby, it’s Namjoon - except, of course, that it just so happens to also be Bobby.

Bobby gets a bit of Namjoon’s skin between his teeth and bites, making Namjoon start. “Okay, okay,” Namjoon mutters, and shoves a hand between their bodies. Bobby’s already got a hand at his belt, pulling at it and thumbing open just enough buttons on his jeans to let Namjoon work a hand in. “You want me to touch you? Sure, I got you - ”

Bobby’s dick is solid behind the cotton of his underwear, and he shudders when Namjoon palms him. He shifts, maneuvering a thigh between Namjoon’s legs, and the sudden pressure on Namjoon’s own erection makes him hiss through his teeth against the slick sweat at Bobby’s temple.

“Come on,” Bobby says, breathless but smug. “What the fuck, Kim Namjoon, is this all you’ve got?”

“Oh, fuck off,” Namjoon replies around an incredulous laugh. God, Bobby sucks so much. “I don’t have shit to prove to you.”

He doesn’t, but he still leans back far enough to shove Bobby’s pants out of the way, cutting his eyes between the way Bobby’s dick springs free and the way the chill air of the practice room hitting the thick red tip of it makes his mouth fall open, showing off those stupid, uneven front teeth. Satisfied, Namjoon fists his cock, jacking down and then back up just the once, fast and dry. Bobby makes a noise in the back of his throat that sounds like a whine, but the precome that smears into Namjoon’s palm belies his annoyance.

“Come on, Bobby,” Namjoon can’t help but say, watching as Bobby pants harshly and writhes beneath him, his hips humping the few centimeters between them. “Is this all you’ve got?”

“Can you - ” Bobby says, before biting off the end of the question.

“Use your words.” Namjoon twists his wrist and tightens his fist on the upstroke.

Bobby shudders. Fascinated, Namjoon moves his left hand from the wall to grip Bobby’s jaw, resting his thumb on Bobby’s lower lip and pushing down with his nail. He watches as Bobby flicks his tongue out and draws his thumb into his mouth before biting, just shy of actual hurt. “Can you,” Bobby grits out, the movement jostling Namjoon’s thumb back out, “touch me - you know.”

His eyes are dark, blown wide with arousal, and Namjoon knows what he’s asking for.

“Yeah,” Namjoon says, swallowing. “You got it.”

Namjoon’s not nearly so dexterous with his left hand as he is with his right, but he can handle reaching down to brush the skin behind Bobby’s balls, before following the crease of his ass up to his hole. He presses his thumb, still wet with Bobby’s own spit, just against the entrance, and Bobby comes with a shout, the force of it curving his body forward, until his sweaty forehead is in the crook of Namjoon’s neck, breath harsh against his skin.

Namjoon gives him one magnanimous minute, before settling his hands back on his hips, flipping them around. Bobby’s back is strong and broad when Namjoon rucks his tank top up, touching a hand to where the dimples on his back shift. With his other hand, he’s reaching down. He lets out a hiss when he draws his zipper down, feeling the teeth of it bite at his hard-on underneath. Fucking Rick Owens.

His dick is a familiar weight in his hand after Bobby’s, and Namjoon has to squeeze the base a few times to keep himself from coming embarrassingly fast. It’s a close call as is, especially when he settles it against the top of Bobby’s ass, using his slight height advantage to set a hard and fast rhythm that has Bobby swearing and shuddering, and pushing his hips back against Namjoon. It’s a team effort to ensure that Namjoon won’t last long, which he doesn’t.

Namjoon’s fingers are tense when he finally uncurls them from around Bobby’s hips, and Bobby flinches.

“Okay?” Namjoon asks, stepping back. There’s a stripe of come in the small of Bobby’s back. Namjoon’s own dick is still hanging out, pants tight where they were shoved down his hips. He’s tired, suddenly. He wants nothing more than to go home and sleep for years.

Bobby still has his back to him, though he makes a small sound of disgust when he reaches around to press a hand against his back for a stretch and gets a palmful of Namjoon’s spunk for his troubles.

He's shrugging as he turns around, pulling his pants back up. “Not bad.”


End file.
